You could never replace the crackle

that came armed with a moment

of silence in the dead of night

or the giant Everyready PP9 battery

that would weigh your father’s pocket

down on one side and made him

appear as if he was stooping over

at the tender age of thirty-five

and which would feel like you

were cradling gold up the stairs

to put in the radio,

your companion at night

when darkness fell

but sleep was but a tiresome illusion.

 

The switch turned on, the glow

of possibilities seemingly endless,

words covered in silk whilst I cowered

cold and illuminated by a single light

from inside another world, here

I got an education, from under the covers

of my bed in the dark,

or on a Saturday afternoon as places

on a map were imagined

over a one-one draw as City

lacked strength up front

without Peter Barnes on the wing;

it was the dark though,

nestled in comfort of hearing far away

voices in my head,

of songs sang with seduction

and unmistakeable meaning to a boy

barely old enough to climb, ungainly,

on his father’s motorbike

and pretend for a moment that he was

Eval Knieval,

the gap just that inch too wide

to worry about crashing into the ravine below

or the inevitable crash of anger

as my dad told me to get off the bike…

…it was in the dark that I heard voices

in a tongue that made no sense,

Hancock’s Half Hour enriching my young life,

devastated at an early age to hear

that he could not take the fame, glory

or his own black dog. Saturday Sports Report,

the book at bedtime, the garbled mess

of radio delivery as static bounced

round my room as England

stuttered against Australia,

stumps and bed clothes sent flying

as wicket fell.

 

All this as I bathed in single

light illumination,

the wireless attached to me by power,

by invisible strings played with horse hair

and coils, springs and draining

battery power…

I was radio-active then,

give me radio over television

anyday, for I would rather close my eyes

and run back to the cover

of my bed and listen

to the sound of infinity

under a single small light.

 

Ian D. Hall 2016